NEW BOOK: Democracy NOW Interview + 8 KEY FACTS

Dear Friends,

I'm excited to announce that my new book is out: HOODWINKED: Former Economic Hit Man John Perkins Reveals Why the World Financial Markets Imploded—and How to Remake Them. Below I've provided two things that serve as a primer to the book. First, is my interview with Amy Goodman of Democracy Now. My conversation with Amy gave me an opportunity to set the stage for the work we all have ahead. Additionally, below, I have provided a detailed summary of eight key facts about HOODWINKED to support and inspire your contributions creating the change we need.

John Perkins Interview with Amy Goodman - Democracy NOW

8 KEY POINTS to Support Your Important Work:

HOODWINKED provides the facts – and many personal stories from economic hit men, jackals, business execs, politicians, and educators – behind the following eight key points:

1. The United States.The US – in fact the world – has been stolen by the very wealthy and powerful, the corporatocracy.

2. Failed System. This has created a failed system – unsustainable, unjust, unstable, dangerous.

3. Predatory Capitalism. The cause is a mutant, viral form of capitalism – what I call “Predatory Capitalism” that began with President Reagan and the philosophy that a) the only goal of business is to make profits, b) corporations should not be regulated, and c) every major economic sector should be privatized. This virus has spread with each subsequent administration.

4. Mutant forms of Capitalism. 9/11 was a shock used by the Bush administration to boost this mutant form of capitalism to unprecedented new levels: privatize the military (and introduce privatized Homeland Security); further deregulate financial institutions; radically increase military budgets; and encourage shopping and excessive materialism.

5. The Crises We Really Need to Fear. The 9/11 shock distracted us from the crises we really need to fear: climate change, resources diminishing at accelerating rates, increasing prices for fuel, foods, and other essentials, violence that results from exploited people living desperate, starving lives, overpopulation, general environmental and social degradation. For the first time in history, every human being – every life form – is confronted by these same crises.

6. Countries and presidents have lost power. Corporations have the power. World geopolitics may be represented by huge clouds (the multinational companies) drifting around the planet; they know no borders and obey no specific sets of laws.

7. The GOOD NEWS: we control corporations. The market place is democratic. The way out is for us the people to support companies that are committed to a sustainable, just, peaceful world; to institute regulations that codify this; to recognize as heroes men and women who are dedicated to creating a world our children and their brothers and sisters around the planet will want to inherit -- in essence to rid ourselves of the mutant virus and create a new type of capitalism.

8. We're in this TOGETHER. We are all in this together and we are all communicating with each other. The Internet and cell phones offer opportunities to unite us like never before in the human experience.

We the people must create the change.

I am encouraged by grassroots movements across this planet (described in HOODWINKED) and by the commitment of students on campuses in the US and throughout the world. Please read HOODWINKED, share it with your friends, and let’s together create a sustainable, just, and peaceful world.

I hope too that I will see you at one of the upcoming book signings – please see my website for the schedule of events – http://www.johnperkins.org .

I like that John Perkins cares. And, incidentally, I really like his word 'corporatocracy', which I use all the time.

While I would never want to discourage people from caring, I can't say that I care about saving capitalism. You can have it, if you want it. But...

It's people and their intentions that really matter and the subject of what sort of system we choose to live under is separate. I just don't believe in capitalism - which means that I don't believe that you can create a 'perfect' capitalism - even though I basically agree with John about the way capitalism works today and I'd be happy if caring people managed to get capitalism to work 'better'. But how do you get a ripe fruit to be something other than what it is? Because neoliberal/disaster/predator capitalism is really just ripe capitalism in my view.

In my view, Money exists for one reason only, namely so that 'some' can have more of it, and more of what it buys, than others. That's all.

Money is indeed, as the apostle Paul said long ago, a root of all sorts of evil. Paul, however, did not council Jesus's followers to attack the money system, such as it was. His admonishment to flee from the the things that money 'can' do to men was really an admonishment for people to embrace something else, namely a godly form of living, and to have good intentions toward others.

The corporatocracy's leaders did not lead the rest of us down the 'only' path there is. Darkness isn't the only path available to us, even as imperfect humans. The corporatocracy's early fathers chose to break rules that we all, sensibly, live by as human beings and social creatures, so as to gain advantages and dominance in society, with which they could thereafter, in their minds (then and now), guarantee outcomes and thereby ensure their own security. Well, That's one way to go about society-building. The problem with their choice is that it wasn't really easier, let alone morally superior, to do that instead of simply pulling together with the rest of us to make a system that works for everyone.

So, Here we are, living under a corporatocracy in which a minority does okay by feeding, like a vampire class, on the majority, which, since it (minority) chooses to be infected by the virus of predatory, vampire capitalism, it must also disparage and denigrate. Because it's a lot easier to exploit a 'bewildered herd', an 'unruly rabble', or what have you, than fellow citizens, some whom may be relatives, brothers, sisters, friends, etc.. So the people, who must be preyed upon, are the enemy.

There are shocking situations in the world where that reality is underscored in dramatic fashion, such as in Haiti, where the Haitian elites, allies of foreign governments and their capitalist partners, who live in gated communities in the hills outside Port Au Prince, keep the majority of Haitians in nightmarish poverty, again with the help of corporatocracy governments. ("The army is our first enemy," [Jean-Bertrand Aristide] insisted, and in "Haiti like anywhere else in Latin America elections are in the hands of the oligarchy who use them to undermine popular demands." -pg 31 of "Damming The Flood," by Peter Hallward) Elsewhere, A bit of thinking is required by the people to appreciate the lessons John Perkins and others who also care are trying to teach.

Here in North America, the capitalist class can't lose. They have sophisticated propaganda, brutal (draining and distracting) work culture (but not as bad as it could be, clearly) and consumerism (fed by propaganda that says that capitalism is the true religion).

We also have information overload that peoples elsewhere would give arms and legs to have access to. But the capitalist class seems to have that one covered, as each of us sits in isolation in front of the boob tube watching hockey, dance with the stars or what have you. My beef with my fellow majority citizens isn't that they self-tranquilize. I'm human and I need that too. My beef with them is that while they do that they need to still care. And there isn't enough care among my own class to make a difference. And you can't make people care.

A final word about capitalism, if I may make this overly long post a little longer. You can run a man down with a crappy, beater car. Or you can just go about your business, buying groceries, taking the kids to school and going to work, in that same car and never harm anyone in the process. It's what you, the human being driving the car, intends to do, that matters.

Additionally, You can get that perfect, supernatural car maker to make you a perfect car, which he'll do for you if you are good, and you can then use that to go about your business of living peacefully with your neighbors. Unless you don't believe that supernatural, perfect car maker exists. Or worse, Unless you believe he's you.

Have read all three of your books, wondering what is next! Have been very interested in the information given in all 3!

What are you pursuing at the present time--since the SECRET HISTORY OF THE AMERICAN EMPIRE? Am encouraging everyone I know to read any of your 3 books--the information you provide is verified by many other sources--thanks for putting yourself "on the line" so to speak to provide this information--it's sad more people are NOT interested in knowing how the U.S. Govt really works/i.e. doesn't really work--around the world! Beyond sad--despicable behavior on the part of the U.S. Govt and U.S. Corporations!

Nations govern by Mafias,Cabals,Conspirators out to loot the Natural recsuroes n Commonwealth of their Peoples cannot claim to practice Capitalism. And this is true of majority of African Countries. They do not allow truely Free Enterprise to thrive.They tax the people without deploying the revenue to sectors to enhance free enterprise-infrastructures,functional institutions and facilities,etc. They practice Nepotism,Favouritism,frauds,scams,etc all that corrupt n distort true Capitalist practices. Africans in d majority see themselves applying their Mind/Reason to the problem of survival,with most achieving little or no success. That's why poverty is ravaging the continent. That is why Africans are the Beggars' of the World.That is why Objective Moral Truths n Justice derived from Capitalism still do not quite hold water' in Africa. And Nigeria is a classic example of where Capitalism as described is not allowed to thrive.

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